


untangle this

by SycoraxSebastian



Category: Twelfth Night - Shakespeare
Genre: (or what you will), Almost Drowning, Bedsharing, Blow Jobs, Gay Pirates, Hand Jobs, M/M, additionally - Freeform, again shakespeare is rolling in his grave, and that is just the way i like it, and this time we are at sea, antonio deserves so much better, both of whom conceal their true names from their beloveds, but hey think of this as symbolic parallels between sebastian and viola, for accuracy, goddamnit this gay pirate is going to get a happy ending and then some, homoerotic swordfighting, i will update these tags as i dive deeper into my own pedantry, overuse of the word sea for dramatic effect, sebastian calls himself roderigo for the three months he and antonio are alone, so the whole first part of this has got him calling himself roderigo, so this is really just excellent scholarly work with, some good old fashioned kissing at sea, swordFLIRTING if you will, well here we are again with some homosexual shakespeare nonsense, you have no idea how many times I tried to type sebastian and had to delete
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 03:34:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23538442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SycoraxSebastian/pseuds/SycoraxSebastian
Summary: If a man pulls another man from the waves, is he not liable to fall in love with him? Or at least, in lust? And how long with those feelings last? Through a storm, perhaps, but can they carry him to shore, and past shore, to land?Antonio deserves more than to be cast off and castaway. An attempt at acquiring happiness for Antonio, and by extension, for Sebastian.
Relationships: Antonio/Sebastian (Twelfth Night)
Comments: 9
Kudos: 20





	untangle this

Antonio had been unlucky in his plunderings, recently. He had boarded ship after ship, certain they held what he was missing, what he wanted, but they had all been conspicuously empty, or filled with oranges halfway to rotting, or... They were not the kind of spoils he was used to. Not the kind of spoils he hoped for. His crew was getting restless. Their hands twitched to their swords at the slightest shift in the breeze, and he could smell the urge to fight wafting off of them like death rises from a corpse. The whole ship stank. Antonio stank with it, stagnant. Bored. Boredom was fatal for a captain on a pirate ship. Boredom preceded mutiny, and mutiny was an apocalypse to someone like Antonio. He could not imagine not being in charge. He had forced himself to forget any moment he had spent obeying someone else’s orders. It was for his own good.

“Storm coming,” called Zalo, from the crow’s nest. No shit, storm’s coming, the sky was black with it, and the sea roiled like it had something to prove. Antonio sighed, and moved to move the rest of his crew into some semblance of action.

They swarmed their own ship, his crew did, like they were trying to take it, tying down everything that could shift, keeping a special care of the balance, and the weight, throwing overboard all they did not need. It was ruthless, their efficiency. They were pirates. The last of the crew was just scurrying below-deck, Antonio readying the ropes he would use to tie himself to the ship’s wheel (a reckless, heroic precaution. Antonio had no intention of going down with the ship), when he saw the other ship.

Lightning split the air, fracturing off the raindrops that poured from the heavy clouds, blinding him for a moment with their brilliance, before darkness rolled in again. The ship was smaller than theirs, passenger, or merchant, he did not know— nothing he would have wasted his time on attempting to storm, but now the storm was attempting something in his stead. The scene was illuminated again by another flash of lightning, and the ship split in two— a perfect halving, almost like twins. The severance was punctuated by a great groan from the ship, with percussive tinny screams from its passengers. Antonio had been rooted to the deck, watching, for too long. The rope he held hung heavy in his hands, encrusted with salt that had been whipped up from the sea and into his face. The wind whirled about him, but he could not tear his eyes away. 

There was something about this shipwreck that seemed like fate. Antonio had been in battles. He had killed men, and mourned them. He knew destruction, and he knew when to look away, but this was more terrifying by virtue of being farther away. The other ship was small, already, but the storm and the splitting made it into a toy, a foolish thing, a bauble, to be wave-tossed and tempest-taken. There were people on that ship. Antonio did not care about people, as a rule, but he felt for the occupants of that ship. He understood being at the mercy of the sea. For this understanding, he continued to watch as the ship’s two halves were torn apart by the grasping hands of the waves, as the screams grew quieter, as the ocean swallowed them all. 

A third bolt of lightning brought new light upon the wreck, and Antonio’s eyes were caught by a new shape in the disarray. Strapped to a mere splinter of the mast, like a martyr (like a curse), a young man was bobbing up and down in the cruel tides. Antonio did not think (it was why he was a good captain). He lashed one end of the rope to his ship, tied the other end around his waist, and threw himself overboard. It was a lucky thing for him that his crew was all below-deck. If they had been there to see this flight of fancy, they’d have laughed, which Antonio wouldn’t have been able to stand. As it was, he was alone aboveboard, and all he knew was that he needed to save the man in the sea.

The storm had stirred the sea into a frenzied beast of a thing, and it surged around Antonio with such ferocity he began to doubt his judgement in leaping. He shook off the fear. Fear would only weigh him down, and he needed to float. He cut through the choppy waters with precise strokes. The young man was limp against his mast, he saw, as a wave broke over his head. He summoned more strength, and swam with more urgency. His breath got tight in his chest, and the roaring in his head joined the roaring in the ocean, a terrible cacophony of danger, ringing in his ears. The sea pressed in on him on every side; the young man seemed farther away than before. It was futile, this little rescue mission of his. Who did he think he was going to save? Who was he to save anyone, anything? He was not a redeemer, he was a pirate, a saltwater thief. He wrecked things. That was what he was… but he shook his head, flinging the water and the darkness out of himself again. 

Like a tree falling in the forest, the young man was right above him as he broke the surface. He was smaller than he had seemed from far away, and thoroughly salt-stricken. The ropes that bound him to the mast had been loosened by the storm, which meant that Antonio could free the man with little effort on his part. He held tight to him, though, while he untied him, He did not want to lose him to the sea, not after he had thrown himself and some portion of his dignity overboard. The man was unconscious, which he would allow himself to be worried about later, when they were in the safe haven of his ship— his kingdom. 

He swam, almost mindlessly, dragging the almost drowned man behind him, hauling on his own lifeline when he felt his strokes weaken. When they reached the side of his ship (oh, God, a heavenly thing), Antonio realised his error. How could he get this lifeless creature onto his ship? He was winded by the waves himself, but he could clamber up and over the sides of a sailing ship, if he couldn’t, he had no right to call himself captain. But could he do it with such a significant dead weight? He remembered the rope, and blessed his earlier self for the intelligence his current, more foolish self lacked. He rigged the other man to his back, looping him across his shoulders. He decided to trust the rope, trust that it would hold, rather than question it further, as the wind pulled itself into a frenzy. He wanted to get out of these uncertain waters. Hand over hand over hand over hand, he dragged himself and his silent passenger up the steep side of his ship (had it always been such a peak? Had it always been such a strenuous journey? Was he getting weak?). The wood splintered under his hands and he found himself praying under his breath that this would not be the way he died. For this foolishness, this momentary belief in a greater fate (a greater good, the soft heart he kept hidden whispered to him), he was set to perish? Never. Never would the sea be able to claim it had bested him! With this sentiment striking his prayers from his lips, he surged in strength and pulled himself and his dear dead weight over the side of his ship and onto the welcome deck. 

Oh, lovely, lovely, lovely familiar ground. Not solid, but home! Safe in that it was familiar. Antonio did not kiss the timbers that trembled below him, but he tread more lightly on them than he was wont to, in deference to their kindness, their surety. Glorious, they were! 

He pulled, with a gentleness he would never admit to possessing, the ropes from his shoulders, and with them, the drowned man from his back. He set him down on the deck while the storm raged around them. For a moment, he allowed himself the luxury of beholding. Who was this stranger he had plucked from the gaping maw of the sea? Who owed him his life?

The man he’d pulled from the waves was striking. Though thunder rumbled overhead, following flashes of lightning, Antonio felt like he had been cracked in two by his own bolt of lightning, a heavenly assault he had dragged onto his ship over his own shoulders. Oh, notable pirate, carry home your own destruction! Whoever this man was, he was delicate. He was pristine. Salt flecked his long lashes, and he was haloed by dark hair curling round his temples like laurel leaves. Clusters of freckles stellated across his long and slightly crooked nose, curving over full lips and a jawline made sharp by sorrow. Antonio held no space in his heart for any sort of heaven, but this, this man was holy. Something like belief, tinged with lust, fluttered in his gut. 

Antonio watched as the man coughed. He convulsed in a miniature imitation of the breaking of his ship, spewing brine. Antonio pushed him onto his side as he continued to vomit, wary of the way men drown on dry land, choking on their own bile. He curled, question-mark, in on himself. All Antonio could do was watch as the man shifted, fish out of water, on the deck. The storm raged around them, slopping sea water onto the deck, which swirled around him and his mystery of a man. He was too sick to move, it seemed. All he could do was wait it out. Antonio held him on his side, looming over him to shelter him from the worst ravages of the storm. What his crew would say if they saw the single-mindedness of his care, he did not know. This kind of kindness was rare for the captain, though not unheard of.

After several harsh minutes, the sky began to clear. The clouds lost their cruel tint, and the rain lessened, to a shower, then a drizzle, until it abated completely. The sea calmed. No more the shaking and the rolling, instead it rocked them with all the love a mother rocking her child would show. Antonio reached out and smooth the curls from the forehead of the man he rescued, drawing his hand back in dismay when he found him hot and feverish. Oh, the sea was a fickle friend, unusual in its cruelty. The man stirred at the cool press of Antonio’s hand, and blinked at him.

“Viola?” he whispered. The salt water had cracked his voice, but Antonio could tell he was not from these parts. His accent was familiar, though foreign. 

“Who?” Antonio asked, despite himself. 

“Viola? Where are you?” his dark eyes were unfocused, seeing ghosts beyond Antonio, beyond the ship, beyond this world. Antonio ached for this strange man. He could not break the news to him, that whoever he was searching for was likely five fathoms below them, carried away on a strange tide. Instead, he bent to the young man, and helped him up, to secret him away to the safety of his cabin (the joys of being a captain!) before the rest of his crew came up from below. He could live or die there in peace, and no one would question it. When he was healthy, then Antonio could come to terms with the decision he had made. A spur of the moment moment of weakness, and now he was questioning his own authority as captain. His crew could choke. 

The young man was heavy in his arms, water-logged, and full of mumbling. He seemed to be crying out for a sister, or a wife, someone dear to him, lost at sea, presumably. He clung to Antonio with a desperation he found desperately attractive. The man was ill, sure, but he pulsed with life. He would not die. God, let him live.

…

For three nights, Antonio nursed the strange man through his fever. He suffered all the indignities of this post, wringing vomit from his sheets, cleaning up piss and shit, and other human discretions from his patient. He had never done such a thing before, having been an avowed loner for most of his adult life. A whore in a port or a dalliance with a green crewmate was one thing, this kind of intimacy was something else completely. The dark walls of his cabin, marred by past thrown knives and other things glowed with the sickness the strange man had caught. But they were also filled with a humanity Antonio had not realized he longed for. Here he was, thinking of someone who was not himself, someone who could offer him little to nothing in return for his care. It cheered him. It warmed his belly, and brought a fire to his cheeks that had nothing to do with the high sun in the sky, nor the rum he drank to steady himself. The crew was baffled by it. Zalo tried to laugh at him for it, this odd good humor, but he could not be shaken by his first mate’s mirth.

“What’s gotten into you, Antonio?” he asked.

Antonio laughed and said “I don’t know, Zalo, but I’m only human, and allowed a little joy, when all’s said and done.”

“We haven’t plundered anything worthwhile in weeks, cap’n,” Zalo murmured. “The crew is getting antsy. I’d look for something soon if I were you.”

“Are you threatening mutiny, my dear?” Antonio looked at his first mate. He looked away from him, eyes darting out to sea. The gold earring in his scarred ear glittered, and Antonio fought the urge to tug it out. See how that kind of betrayal felt to him.

“I’m not, God knows I would never, but Sanio has been whispering about you getting soft…” Zalo trailed off. He shaded his eyes against the weak sun. 

“I see.”

“Be careful,” Zalo told him, and clapped him on his shoulder. Antonio grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him in close. His first mate cringed away from him, but he held fast.

“Zalo, I’m grateful for the care, but I resent the notion that I cannot handle any little grievances my crew may have on my own,” He tightened his grip, feeling the bones stark against skin. He did not squeeze further, but the threat was clear. “Don’t think I have forgotten what you stand to gain from any mutiny that occurs, murmured of or no. Tread lightly, sailor mine.” He winked and let Zalo go. It was time to find Sanio and teach him a lesson. It would be life or death if he couldn’t learn. 

He found him in the kitchen, inexpertly hacking at a fish with a knife too small and too dull to achieve anything like precision. Sanio looked up from his torn apart fish and blanched. 

“Captain!” 

“You know,” Antonio said, walking closer. His hand was not on his sword, but there were knives hidden about his person that no one but he knew of, and he was close to drawing them, always. “I’ve heard murmurings about your murmurings, heard of little sprinkles of dissent among my men. The hand spelling mutiny is not yours, is it?”

Sanio’s eyes widened. “No, sir.”

“Oh, Sanio. I don’t like being lied to.”

“Captain, I swear, I wasn’t saying anything—” 

Antonio cut him off with a raised hand. Sanio shook, just a little, a leaf in a great gale. “You swear? And all those swearings will you o’erswear?”

The other man did not respond to this. Antonio smiled. It was a frightening smile. He had all of his teeth. They were rather white, and they near-glowed in the damp darkness of the ship’s kitchen. All of Antonio’s crewmates knew, when he smiled with his teeth out, that was when they should start sharpening their swords. Teeth out meant a duel. A duel with Antonio meant death. Or shame. No one was sure what was worse. 

“I won’t ever do it again, I just— you’ve been moody, you’ve been changeable—”

“So is the sea,” Antonio responded evenly. He advanced on the other man, skirting around the island in the middle of the kitchen. Sanio shrunk back, but there was nowhere for him to hide in the cramped room. The ship swayed in the sea and the rows of pots and pans clattered together in the move. 

“Fight me like a man, Antonio!” Sanio cried, a last ditch effort as his captain drew closer.

“I would if you deserved it. But you are a rat, and must be dealt with accordingly.” Antonio drew one of his secret knives. It flashed like his teeth, glinting, dangerous. 

“Only a coward would kill a man in the dark. Are you afraid of me, Captain?” Sanio sneered, biting back his fear. Antonio huffed out a sound of displeasure and sheathed the knife. It disappeared completely. No one could say where it had come from, or where it had gone.

“No, Sanio, but I would have given you the dignity of a quiet death, as opposed to a loud and public one,” Antonio grabbed the other man by his ratty hair. He hauled him out of the kitchen and deposited him in a heap on the deck. The members of his crew who were above board stopped what they were doing. They stared. Antonio was vibrating with rage. Sanio cowered, like the rodent he was, shivering on the deck.

“You wanted to fight like a man? Stand, then. Challenge me.”

Sanio did not stand. He remained a heap of nothing. 

“Come, then,” Antonio said. “Am I so soft now? Changeable?”

“Captain—” Sanio began, his voice one quake.

“Do not speak to me unless it is with a sword in your hand and a challenge on your lips. If you cannot provide me that, I must ask you to escort yourself off of this ship.”

The other man wilted. Antonio waited, as a courtesy. A show of chivalry, nothing more. He needn’t have bothered. Sanio was picking himself up, and walking himself into his watery grave. There was a splash when he went overboard, and then silence. Antonio had not even drawn his sword. The crew was all silence. A seagull cried out overhead. The waves lapped gently at the sides of the boat. The sea and the crew held their breath, and then, there was a cry from somewhere on the ship. The man he had rescued had woken. Antonio gave the gathered crew a curt nod, and rushed off to his cabin.

The strange man was sitting up in Antonio’s bed (which he had relinquished to serve as hospital cot), hair standing on end, wild-eyed.

“Who are you?” he asked. Lucid. Marvelous.

Antonio did not answer yet, merely reached his hand out to touch the other man’s forehead, to feel if what he suspected was true. His forehead, though sticky with sweat, was cool. Not a deathly chill, but a blessedly human temperature. His fever had broken. He found himself smoothing the other man’s hair away from his brow before he realized the impropriety of the act. They were strangers still, no matter the indignities Antonio had witnessed and suffered from his patient, his passenger. He pulled his hand back.

“Who are you?” he echoed.

“I asked you first,” the other man replied. He glanced down, noticed he was bare-chested, and gathered the coarse sheets around him, a move towards modesty.

“Yes, but it is my bed you are currently in,” Antonio said. He hung back. Although he had dived into the heaving sea to rescue this man, he was a complete unknown, and thus, a danger, until he proved himself to be otherwise.

“Oh!” his cheeks flushed at that. “I am,” he paused, swallowed, and said “called Roderigo.”

This was a lie. Antonio could smell the horse shit from the corner of the room, but he did not call it. It was so obvious a falsehood, it did not pose a real threat. Let him have that. A comfort in these strange times.

“Welcome to the land of the living, then, Roderigo,” Antonio said, with a smile. This had no teeth, it was almost too small to be perceived, but it was real, and hid no malice. 

“So. I told you mine. Tell me yours,” Roderigo returned. He seemed to have forgotten his fear, and his sorrow, and was now all impish, all taunting. 

Antonio laughed. “I am Antonio.”

“And?”

“And? This is my ship.”

“Your ship?”

“Yes,” Antonio replied. “It’s a marvelous thing, possession. I own this ship.”

“How did you acquire her?” Roderigo asked. He had relaxed once he had a name to apply to Antonio. Something to cling to. He looked at him like he trusted him, or at least wanted to. This was a young man who understood that he had to be afraid of things, but his fear, Antonio thought, was misplaced. To tell him a false name was fine, was right, but to take him on his word? That was where he should have hesitated and drawn back.

“Oh, I won a fight.”

“Like an auction?” Roderigo asked. His eyebrows knit together in confusion.

“No, I fought a man. With a sword. He lost. I won.”

Roderigo stared. His jaw dropped, just a little. Antonio could see the wheels spinning in his pretty head.

“So,” Antonio began, as Roderigo said, at the same time—

“So, you’re a pirate?” His wide eyes narrowed, and he began to shift like he no longer trusted the bed he was in to hold him up. The bedsheets, too, were suspect.

“I am but a humble sea captain. More or less,” Antonio returned. He was not sure why he twisted the truth, but there was something about Roderigo that made him want to maintain his trust. Whether he could maintain his lie, though, and for how long, was another thing entirely.

“More or less?” Roderigo prodded. 

“Why should I tell you more? Or less? You have told me only your name. I have given you a bounty of information, in comparison. Who are you, Roderigo? Where were you going? What would you do there?” Antonio sat down on the edge of the bed with that, and was pleased to see that the other man did not shrink away from his approach.

“I…” Roderigo started to speak, and trailed off. He looked away from Antonio, eyes glazing over as he saw something in the distance. A shade passed over his face. The thing he saw was not a joyous thing. Antonio could almost hear his thoughts, the splintering of the deck, the screaming, the fear. He tasted salt in sympathy and leaned forward. He put his hand on the other man’s knee. It was an unfamiliar gesture to him, he who would rather cut than coddle as he moved through the world. He could not afford to be tender, no matter how much his heart cried out for care. Roderigo looked up at him.

“The sea is cruel,” Antonio said. “She takes and she takes, and she does not care who weeps for what is lost. We have all lost our hearts to her, in one way or another.”

“My sister,” Roderigo whispered. He choked on something. A tear, perhaps. Antonio looked away. He heard him swallow, once. Then lie. “My sister will not know if I have lived. She lives in Messaline. A lady, sir, far brighter than I. Like a star, or a planet, perhaps. I was in her orbit until I was called to sea. She will hear that my ship sank, but she will not know that I have survived. She will… to imagine that I have died, it will break her heart.”

Antonio looked at him for a long moment. Several breaths, while Roderigo’s words hung in the air. Antonio was sure that this story was not the truth, but he could not tell what purpose this lie served. Had his sister been on the ship and thus, swallowed by the sea? Or was there no sister, but a lover, left on land? Antonio did not fear for his own lie, then, for they were both building fortresses around themselves to protect their secrets from discovery. Let them lie, then. Antonio could not afford to be precious about the truth, nor could he afford to be precious about this man. He could not help wanting more—of what, though, he was not sure. His hand burned where he held Roderigo’s knee, and he pulled it back. Roderigo looked up at him, his eyes bright with a sorrow he was not willing to share, and something else. The unknown feeling in his eyes shook Antonio to his core. It was soft, and it seemed like gratitude. What would he do with that? Served him right, pulling strange men from the sea like fish to be filleted and consumed. 

…

It took Roderigo another week before he was strong enough to leave Antonio’s cabin, and Antonio was grateful for that week, for it offered him time to concoct his own amalgamation of lies to explain the mysterious appearance of a new sailor. Weak at the knees, wet behind the ears, Antonio suspected that his delicate companion came from money, and would be cowed to soupy submission by his crew. Why he was worried about the constitution of Roderigo, he did not know—or knew, but did not wish to examine. Regardless, it was challenging to brush off the urge to protect him, an urge which would only serve to endanger Roderigo, and by extension, Antonio, further. His men were still antsy from their bad luck, antsier still after Sanio walked himself off the plank. Any indication of favor towards Roderigo would doom him. The weakness implied by the existence of that favor on his part, worried Antonio more. Roderigo would have to hold his own. How he could do that, Antonio did not know. From what he had seen, the man was charmingly foolish. Kind, sure, beautiful, of course, but clever? Not particularly. If anything, he was bookishly smart, and untutored in the ways of the world. He did not blink when, the night after his fever broke, Antonio crawled into his own bed, next to him, and fell asleep. There was nothing untoward (yet) about their shared sleeping space, but Antonio had expected the other man to raise more of a cry about the intrusion. Antonio had muttered something about his back, and the indignity of sleeping on the floor when he was the captain of the ship, and Roderigo had not questioned it. And so, they had slept side-by-side for the rest of the week. 

As it was, Antonio was beginning to lose his mind at the newfound tenderness he felt towards the man he had rescued. He knew, objectively, that the man was pretty. He had eyes, and a taste that skewed more male than anything else—many at sea shared his palate, but they spoke little of it. The direction of the inclination was not the issue as much as the vulnerability affection created. He and Zalo had had their share of shared indiscretions—after a sea battle, Zalo pressed against the wall of his cabin, straddling Antonio’s thigh, hushed, hurried and hot, or on a drunken night, Antonio swallowing more than ale, bitter, and sharp—but that did not mean affection entered into the equation. Pleasure was pleasure. It was not the same as love. Antonio gagged a little on that word. Love? He did not know the man now, any better than he knew him when he pulled him from the waves. He had a name, but he knew that was a lie. He had little else, for Roderigo seemed content to sit in silence, or else talk for long stretches of time about the things Antonio had done at sea. He found himself telling the other man more than he had ever told another soul, even Zalo, and at the end of the week, he realized that Roderigo knew him almost completely (they still talked around the piracy, but he was sure that it was implied, if not known), when he knew Roderigo not at all.

And still! And still, each night, they lay next to each other, not quite touching, not quite pulling away. At first, he thought it was due to the proximity of another body that his own body was so alert, but after his cock stood down, he could not control the beating of his heart when Roderigo would inevitably sigh in his sleep and press closer to Antonio. This warmth was more than lust. Oh, God. 

Most mornings, Antonio woke before his companion, negotiated an escape from their bed (their bed! He was getting soft—well, at the moment, he was hard, but the point, like his cock, still stood), hurried to the head, and furiously beat off the results of a night wrapped in Roderigo before anyone in his crew, including Roderigo, awoke. He was lucky the other man was a luxuriously late riser. After a week, it had gotten tiresome. He needed to reveal Roderigo to the rest of his crew so he could sleep in the sleeping quarters with them, away from him. Antonio needed to be alone with his traitorous, waxen heart, if only to talk some sense into it. No good could come from an infatuation with so strange (and so unknown!) a man as Roderigo. If he was to be ostracized, or worse, killed, by Antonio’s crew, it needed to be soon, before Antonio was irrevocably attached. 

“So,” Roderigo said, one afternoon, when the sun was just climbing down from its noon height, piercing the porthole eye of the cabin, “when can I meet your crew?”

“Huh?” Antonio replied. He had been caught by the intersection of Roderigo’s collarbones, and had tangled the threads of their conversation.

“You know, the other people on this ship, the ones who keep it going? Or do you mean to say that we are all alone out here? Is this some sort of ghost ship? Am I dead? Are you God?” his voice took on a joking tone, but his eyes were wide and dark, and Antonio almost believed that Roderigo believed his own bizarre ideas.

“Wait! No! None of those things are true.”

“Are you certain?” Roderigo smiled. His teeth were crooked, lovely in their imperfection. Antonio was only a man. 

“You may meet the rest of the crew today, yes,” Antonio acquiesced. Roderigo whooped. “But,” Antonio continued, “ I must warn you, they are a violent bunch, and they may not take to you. Be careful.”

“Are you implying that I am not a violent one, myself?” Roderigo asked in mock-offense.

“You fainted when I came in with a bleeding cut on my hand. From a seashell.”

“I don’t like blood!” Roderigo crossed his arms and huffed. 

“My point exactly!” Antonio replied. Too soft, he was too soft.

“And I was worried about you!” Roderigo turned on him, got him where he was most delicate. Oh, now he was too soft. Destined for disaster, they both were. 

Antonio sighed. “You must introduce yourself to them. If they see that you are leaning on me, you will be… taken to with even less ease.” 

Roderigo shrugged. “I can hold my own! Don’t worry about me.” He stood up and crossed the little cabin to the door. Antonio held his breath, realized he was holding it, and let it out as Roderigo stepped outside.

There was a clatter and a shout. Zalo.

“Who is this interloper?” he cried. Antonio rounded the corner to see that he had dropped a metal plate in shock. His sword was out. “State your name.”

“I’m Roderigo. And you?” 

Antonio leaned against the door frame. It was a show, nothing more. Or less. He had no stake in it (but, oh, he did, he did indeed, his foolish heart whispered). He watched as Zalo sized up Roderigo. He had not realized how small he was until he saw him matched up with Zalo. Roderigo was diminutive; Zalo was towering. His sword extended his already long arms into a cruel scythe. He had pulled this young man from the waves only to send him to a different, bloodier death. The rest of his crew gathered round Roderigo and Zalo, a sea of spectators perched among the rigging, the barrels, the railings of the ship. Antonio could not claim Roderigo now. He was not one for prayer, but something about the young man inspired such a devotion, such a fear in him that he sent a hope to the sea for him. Better than nothing. 

“Me? I am Zalo, first mate, and a better swordsman than any you will meet, save my Captain, Antonio,” Zalo returned. There was fire in his words, hidden behind a brilliant smile. The wind whipped his long hair around his face, made him look inhuman, made him look divine. There were hollers from the crew. Affirmations. Zalo was an incredible fighter, it was why Antonio had chosen him as first mate. It was what drew them together, in the past. There were tempests in their blood, the two of them, and battle only made the frenzy more impassioned.

“Is that so?” Roderigo asked. Cocky. Antonio shuddered. 

“It is indeed. Care to try me? If you will not tell me how you came to be on this ship, you will have to have a different kind of conversation with me. With steel! See how steady your legs are, then!”

“With pleasure,” Roderigo returned. “Would anyone care to lend me a sword, then?” He glanced around the ship. The crew laughed. There was blood in the water, now, and they were all hungry for some carnage. Sanio’s death had lacked spleen; there was no honor nor enjoyment in his loss. This mysterious young upstart was something else entirely. Antonio resolved to save Roderigo if it got too desperate. He had swallowed too much saltwater not to, his dignity be damned. He shook himself from his thoughts when he heard a gasp. Roderigo now stood holding a sword, his stance relaxed, his posture natural. 

“I thank you for the kind offer, sir,” he murmured, saluting Culo, who had apparently lost his sword to the young man’s nimble fingers. He looked dazed, and pawed at his belt as if hoping to find the sword there, when it was clearly in Roderigo’s easy grip. The mood of the crew shifted. Tension rose.

“Shall we? Sir?” Roderigo continued, extending his thefted sword towards Zalo. Zalo cocked his head, reassessing. He moved in a flash, a flinch, and the clang of swords meeting rang out across the sea. Roderigo parried with ease. He struck at Zalo with a sinuous grace Antonio would not have previously attributed to him, but he wore it well. The two men sang their swords through the air with a speed Antonio could not help but admire. The rest of the crew was rapt, too. Who was this strange man? How was he keeping pace with a devil like Zalo? They quick-stepped across the deck, boards barely creaking, so light were their feet. Roderigo ducked to evade a slashing cut from Zalo, and Zalo stepped out of Roderigo’s way. Antonio almost cried out, there was an opening in Roderigo’s clever defense. Zalo saw it, too. He darted in to take advantage of the blind spot, swinging. Roderigo whirled around, faster than Antonio had ever seen a man move. In rapid succession, Antonio watched as Roderigo repelled Zalo’s strike, stepped in to knock the larger man’s feet from underneath him, and capture his sword in his left hand, as if in one movement. Zalo fell back, and Roderigo pressed his own sword to his throat.

“Wasn’t that fun?” Roderigo asked. He was barely winded. Antonio was salivating. He stepped out from the doorway, clapping slowly.

“Admirable, young man,” he drawled. Roderigo glanced back at him and grinned, as if to say you saw that, right? I can handle myself, can’t I? Antonio nodded in response. “Where did you learn to fight like that?”

“Oh, here and there. Here—” he handed a still-stunned Culo back his sword. “Thanks. You might want to check how the blade sits, it’s a bit off-balance, and that can get you.”

“Uh. Thanks,” Culo squeaked, and hid behind a barrel.

“Well, Zalo,” Antonio said, striding across the deck to his semi-vanquished first mate. He held his hand out to him, and Zalo took it, grunting. He hauled himself up to his feet. “What do you say? Can we keep him?”

“You’re the captain,” Zalo muttered. “We still don’t know where he’s from, or how he got here. I don’t trust it.”

“Ah, but we mustn’t look a gift horse in the mouth! And for a horse, he is rather gifted.” Antonio turned to Roderigo, who beamed. He curtsied cutely, bobbing down and up again like a skiff in the waves.

“Then we shall keep him. You’re lucky, boy, that you were not fighting our captain. A crueller man has not sailed the seas,” Zalo said bitterly. He sheathed his sword and his pride, and fell back into the crowd. 

“Is that so?” Roderigo caught Antonio in his gaze. “I think he seems kind of sweet.” 

Antonio waved him off, and went to find Zalo. He had to do something to ignore the way Roderigo’s skill with the blade had made him flush. Hadn’t he revealed his companion in order to cut this infatuation off at the pass? 

Zalo was hard to find. Hiding, Antonio assumed, from his humiliation. He was lucky to have lost to a duelist who believed in the rules of the duel, a playful partner who did not need to kill or maim to prove his skill. Perhaps Roderigo could afford to be a fool when he was so talented a swordsman. Perhaps he was a worthy… opponent? object of affection? lover? Perhaps he was worthy. Nothing more. Antonio pinched himself to escape his own thoughts, or at least to turn them to Zalo, who was the real concern. Antonio sighed, and looked up, after he had exhausted all the other corners of the ship. Predictable. Zalo was perched in the crow’s nest. Antonio was sure he was not looking for anything on the sea except escape. Fine. If that was the way he handled embarrassment, so be it. Antonio cracked his knuckles and began to climb the mast. The shaking his approach created alerted Zalo to his presence. He peered down at Antonio.

“The great captain must scale great heights to be on par with his lowly first mate, eh?” Zalo chuckled, with a bite of selfish sorrow.

“The great captain would not have to scale to such great heights if his lowly first mate stayed at normal elevations when dealing with his own defeat,” Antonio replied, huffing a little as he clung to the nest. There was only room for one up there; Zalo was lucky Antonio had such strong arms and a dedication to rope.

“A mere slip of a thing defeats me with a smile, and an unbalanced sword? I must eat my words, it seems, for it was not you, but I, who has grown soft. You may kill me, and take him as your first mate, if you wish.” Zalo’s gray eyes were trained on the horizon, but Antonio saw his hands shake.

“And for what purpose do you suggest I do so foolish a thing?”

“I failed.”

“You were lucky. He is no killer.”

“How do you know?” Zalo looked at him then. His face was unreadable. Antonio looked for subtext and found only suspicion. 

“Could you not tell? He is a gentleman—” this word curled Antonio’s lip, caused Zalo to snarl, “and he duels with gentle rules. Besides. No pirate would challenge you.”

“What do you mean?” 

“Zalo, you are known to be a fierce and merciless opponent, second only to me. Who in their right mind would risk their lives in battle with you, when they could risk the same with me to gain a ship and all my bounty if they live?” Antonio itched for his own duel as he said this. He felt it in his hands. Or perhaps that was just the splinters from the crow’s nest.

“Captain, I think you know more about this Roderigo than you are letting on.”

“Of course I do,” Antonio said, smiling (small, without malice) “Would I have let him live, otherwise?”

Zalo let out a breath in a great gust. They both stared at the sea. It told them nothing they did not already know.

…

Antonio’s cabin felt inhumanly large without Roderigo’s constant presence. After he had clambered down the mast, Zalo close behind (never too close), he had eaten quickly, without tasting much. All his mouth seemed to be able to recognize was salt. There was nothing for him to do, so he retired to bed, desperate to sleep off the odd day. He was still vibrating with the intensity of the fight when he undressed for bed. He had been sleeping in almost all his clothing, with Roderigo there, held up by the thin sliver of propriety he tried to maintain between his desire and his reality. He did not enjoy sleeping still bound up by the clothes of the day before, but he was not sure he’d have been able to fall asleep ever if his bare leg brushed Roderigo’s semi-clad one. It was self-preservation, really. He heaved a heavy sigh out and pulled the sheets of his bed over him. A small part of him longed for the days when he was merely a sailor, packed into a swinging hammock to fall asleep to the rhythm of the sea. It would have been easier to cast away his racing thoughts then, surrounded by other sailors. He was grateful, though, for the privacy his higher status afforded him, as it was easier now to imagine Roderigo, alone in a room with a closed door, and feel less shame—

A knock at the door jarred him from this route of thinking. He sat up, pulling the sheets around his bare chest in a memory of Roderigo’s broken fever. Wildly, he flailed around him for a knife, hidden in the side of his bed. He clutched it before answering the knocker.

“Yeah? Whosit?” He cleared his throat and tried again. “Who calls?”

There was a shuffle and a soft laugh. “Roderigo. Can I come in?”

Antonio swallowed. “Of course. Come.”

Roderigo creaked the door open. It was night, and he carried no light. All was dim, but Antonio would have recognized him anywhere, the slope of his shoulders, the curl of his hair, the jittering, hazy silhouette of his crooked nose. 

“I’m sorry to bother you,” Roderigo said, still soft, “but—”

“Didn’t someone set you up with a hammock?” Antonio interrupted, biting down on any tenderness he sensed in Roderigo’s voice. Not that, not now, not ever.

“Yeah, Culo did. He’s an odd one. Wants me to look at his sword again later.”

“Oh?” Antonio choked back a laugh, but Roderigo caught it.

“Not like that. I don’t think so, at least…” 

“No, he’s always over the girls in the brothels when we come into port, I wouldn’t try him. Can never be sure what he’s picked up, beyond ill-advised tattoos of each girl.”

“Oh.” Antonio could almost hear Roderigo blink. “No, I wasn’t…”

“What did you want?” Antonio asked, taking pity on his strange, foolish friend.

“They set me up with the hammock, and I tried to sleep, but. It’s odd, how unmoored I feel, swinging in the air. Like I’m cork, or a rowboat, cut loose from my lashings. It’s odd, too, to sleep without you.” His words hung in the air. Antonio tried not to think about them. He heard, rather than saw, Roderigo move towards his bed. He came to rest, hovering, at the edge. Antonio could feel him shifting back and forth on his feet. He set his knife down. He had forgotten he was holding it, in the glory of the realization that Roderigo was the one trying to get into his room. 

“I—” Roderigo began. He caught Antonio’s wrist. Antonio hoped he could not feel the pounding of his heart. Or maybe he hoped that the other man was similarly unsettled.

“What is your parentage?” Antonio blurted, severing the tension.

“What?” Roderigo asked. He did not let Antonio go. 

“Your parentage. What is it? Where are you from? Who is your father? Where were you going? Why won’t you tell me your name? Your real one?” This all came out in a rush, like he had sliced an artery, blood gushing out unbidden. Oh, he was a mess in the presence of this strange man.

Roderigo laughed. It shimmered in the darkness of the cabin, lit up all of Antonio’s nerves. He did not answer any of Antonio’s questions. Instead, he bent towards him, closed the distance between them, and kissed him with such sweetness that Antonio’s teeth ached. He pulled back. Antonio fell forward, just a little, overbalancing in the absence of the other man.

“Is this good?” Roderigo asked. He traced Antonio’s lips with the pad of his finger.

Antonio blinked several times. “Um. Yes. But. What about your name?”

“Oh, it’s not that important. Or interesting. Can we do this instead?” He crawled into the bed to straddle Antonio. Waited. He was so close, Antonio felt himself shivering in the heat of him. He did not kiss him again, merely sat there, smiling, white teeth flashing in the darkness. What was he waiting for? Antonio shook his head, dazed. “Would you like that?” Roderigo asked again.

“Yes,” Antonio replied. His traitorous heart leapt up again, quashing any notion of collecting information on Roderigo’s mysterious past. A man was allowed a few secrets, wasn’t he? Especially when he could kiss like that.

Antonio sat up a little to kiss Roderigo, pulling him into him with one hand to the back of his head (his curls twined around his fingers, ensnaring him), one hand grasping at his waist. He was slender, compact. Antonio could easily encircle his waist with his hands. Later. He would test that out later. Now, though, he allowed himself to be swept away on the tides of Roderigo’s insistent affection. He pressed Antonio into his own mattress with the same graceful power he fenced with. Quick kisses, little nips with his teeth (like he wanted to swallow Antonio whole, and couldn’t decide what to devour first), his hands were all over—his jaw, his chest, for a moment, the column of his throat—nothing remained for long. It was a steady barrage, and Antonio admired him for it. He tasted like salt, nothing more, nothing less. Some kind of angel from the sea. 

Roderigo pulled back. “Did I ever tell you how grateful I am that you rescued me?”

“No,” Antonio replied, panting. “I don’t think you have.”

“Odd,” Roderigo said, twisting on top of Antonio. The minute shift in position put more pressure on Antonio’s hard cock, which ached. Their hips rocked together, almost unconsciously. Never had he hated his bedsheets more. “That feels like the sort of thing one should say.”

“I rather think so,” Antonio said, or tried to say, because that was when Roderigo slid down his body, pulling the thin sheet that had separated them down with him. He continued his journey down Antonio’s body until he was situated between his thighs, each of which he kissed with great care. Antonio bit back a groan. A lucky thing it was, that he had decided to sleep naked that night. How likely sleep was, well, that was something else entirely.

“Does this count as gratitude? For a life saved?” Roderigo asked, before he wrapped those nimble fingers around Antonio’s cock and licked one long stripe up it. Antonio shuddered, and stuffed his knuckles into his mouth to muffle his cries. There was something about the fact that this was all occurring in his bed, and not crushed against a wall, or in a rented room in a foreign port that made it more real. Like the consequences were greater. Antonio was not one for indulging in his feelings, but he was beginning to fear that his feelings would soon be indulging in him. Roderigo slid his mouth over the head of Antonio’s cock, then farther still, and he was no longer worried about flighty things like emotions as much as he was worried about losing control. There was something in the heat of the other man’s mouth, and the sureness of his hand as he held him down, one arm across his hips to prevent him from thrusting up too far into his soft palate and gagging him that frightened him. The care in it all, compounded by the things he did not know about Roderigo made him bite down on his own knuckle harder, tighten his grip on the other man’s curls. Tighten his grip on himself, who he was. At the moment, all he was was painfully aroused. Every atom of Antonio was concentrated into the places he was in contact with Roderigo—of course his cock, but also his hips and thighs, where Roderigo rested his weight, and then his right hand, where his fingers were twisted in his curls. The exquisite, mindless focus of pleasure wrapped him up, rocked him like the sea. 

Roderigo changed tack, then, and curled his hands around Antonio’s hips, encouraging him to thrust into his mouth, slick with spit and precome. And then it was all fast, and hard, and maybe there were a few too many teeth for Antonio’s taste (for all Roderigo’s skill, all his precision, he was going to have to get sloppy at some point), but he was there, and eagerly lapping at Antonio, like he was drowning and Antonio was fresh air. Salvation in saltwater, indeed. Shaking, Antonio thrust up to meet him, feeling as white hot pleasure gathered into a single, focused point, sharp, cresting.

“Oh, God,” Antonio gasped, tugging at Roderigo’s hair. “I’m going to—” Roderigo hummed like he didn’t care, and stayed down, swallowing as Antonio arched up and came. Bursts of stars danced across his vision in the dark room, and his head fell back onto the mattress. “That’s one way to say thank you,” he continued, when he had gotten his breath back. “Come here.” Arms outstretched, he pulled Roderigo up to rest on his chest. He kissed him, and tasted himself, bitter, on the other man’s tongue. Roderigo moaned into the kiss, and Antonio reached down to find him still clothed, and hard.

“I’m close,” Roderigo murmured, “if you just—” he reached down, too, to negotiate with the closure of his pants. Once he was untangled, Antonio, after licking his own palm, slid his hand down to grasp Roderigo’s cock. He drew his thumb over the head, and Roderigo’s hips stuttered up to meet him.

“Please,” Roderigo whispered, voice raw from before. Antonio groaned, and pressed up to kiss him, stroking in earnest now. Roderigo thrust against him with newfound urgency. Sloppy again, he was desperate as he fucked the tight circle of Antonio’s fist. Antonio did not stop kissing and stroking him until Roderigo came with a strangled sound, back arched, hands scrabbling at Antonio’s back. 

They separated, then, and Roderigo sat up. Antonio’s hand was slick with come, now cooling and sticky. He reached over the side of the bed in hopes of finding the handkerchief he had discarded from that day. He found it, and wiped his fingers clean before offering it to Roderigo, who did the same. 

“Please don’t make me go back to my hammock,” Roderigo said, perched on the edge of the bed like he was afraid he would be sent away for bad behavior. His pants were still undone, and his shirt billowed open. Antonio was still stark naked. He held the power, despite his vulnerable state. 

“I won’t,” Antonio replied.

“Good. I’d get so lonely without you,” Roderigo told him. He stepped out of his pants, but retained his shirt, and crawled into bed with Antonio. He pressed a kiss to Antonio’s chest. He wrapped his arms around him, held him tight. “Cold, too.”

“Alright.” Antonio pulled Roderigo closer. He closed his eyes, and breathed in the scent of him. The sea brought strange gifts. She could be fickle in her affection, sure, but when she was gentle, she was astounding in her generosity. 

Antonio fell asleep, entwined with Roderigo, a veritable Gordian knot. Where one began, and the other ended, no one could tell for sure. And so they slept, each night for three months, rocked by the waves, by each other. Not a single thought of consequences and parentage crossed Antonio’s mind, until one day, when Roderigo asked if they could come to the port in Illyria. For some unfinished business, he said. Illyria rang hollow, bell-like, through Antonio’s chest. A promise, and a curse. He wanted to say no, beg off, but Roderigo had looked up at him, eyes like burnished stars, and there was nothing he could do but obey. Illyria, Roderigo wanted, and Illyria he would get, consequences be damned.


End file.
